Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Just when I think people could not get more self absorbed, entitled & generally ridiculous along comes someone who surprises me. This woman came into the store a few weeks ago & basically demanded that we get her some free stuff. "My son is building a home bar & I want to get him lots of large empty showcase bottles of wine & liquor. You need to get them to me for free of course. There are other stores working with me on this & you need to give me a reason to give you my business."

Uh. Ok. Exactly what business are we talking about? I don't believe I've ever laid eyes on you & now you are demanding free stuff? Really??

While she was in the store she was on the phone with a friend & looked over at a co-worker of mine & said "my friend is going to take me to this party but only if I promise her that I won't ask for anything free from the host." You have got to be kidding me. So obviously she knows how much of a tacky cheapskate she is.

So my boss says to me "Alright. I'll go out of my way to get whatever I can for this woman so I can show her that this store is where she needs to shop. We are the type of place that goes above & beyond." Well yes. Good point. We do go above & beyond for our customers......even the crappy people who we barely, if ever, see & who demand free stuff.

My boss got a plethora of large format bottles for this woman. She called one day & immediately got an attitude with me on the phone. "Your OWNER was supposed to get me a bunch of FREE bottles for my son's bar & I haven't heard from him."

I said "well actually ma'am he did get a few bottles in for you but he is waiting to hear from some other suppliers to see if he can get some more. He told me he was going to call you by Friday."

There she goes again about her "business". What "business"? Like I said, I don't believe I've ever even seen this woman before she came in to demand we go out of her way to give her free stuff.

So she came in, picked up her free bottles & again said "you have my business." Uggh.

Flash forward to last night when Cheap Demanding Freeloading Woman comes back into the store & now says "I need large empty bottles of bourbon & scotch too. For free of course. You need to get these for me or I'll take my business elsewhere."

5 comments:

The thing with people like that is even if they give you business and on some level appreciate your extra efforts they will forever be threatening to take their business away. Exhausting and so not worth it at some point. Sorry you had to deal with The Wicked Witch of the Cheap, big hugs to you!

Rick-Thanks for reading. I do agree that this person was obviously not worth the headache. I go out of my way for my customers in anyway I possibly can. Sometimes that initial level of service is what secures me a customer (& sometimes a friend) for life. Thats why I continue to do what I do. However this lady was not one of those positive interactions to say the least. I wonder if she will ever read this.....